RT @ByJasonNg: Allianz’s unit, lead reinsurer of #MH370 and #MH17, is also the underwriter for AirAsia http://t.co/NRx8cW0Fl2 #QZ8501

Australia Offers to Ship Energy Supplies to Ukraine

By Rob Taylor

CANBERRA, Australia—Australia offered to send urgently needed energy supplies to Ukraine to help outflank Russian curbs on coal shipments to its smaller neighbor that have contributed to blackouts across the country.

Prime Minister Tony Abbott said resource-rich Australia was ready to sell coal and uranium shipments directly to Ukraine, whose president, Petro Poroshenko, is on a three-day state visit here. Mr. Poroshenko and Mr. Abbott also pledged closer diplomatic and trade ties following the downing earlier this year of a Malaysia Airlines plane, allegedly by pro-Russian rebels in eastern Ukraine.

“Australia is an energy superpower and energy security is very important to Ukraine, particularly given its current vulnerability to supply,” Mr. Abbott told reporters in Melbourne on Thursday. Diplomatic relations between the far-flung allies have warmed since the tragedy, which killed 38 Australian citizens and residents who were on board the downed jet.

Ukraine is embroiled in an armed conflict with pro-Russian militants who have choked off coal supplies from mines in areas under their control. Russia’s blockade has worsened the country’s plight, squeezing the supply of coal to several thermal power plants. A plunging currency has added to Ukraine’s woes.

Mr. Abbott has been a vocal critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin over his backing of the separatists, who are accused of shooting down Flight MH17 with 298 people aboard in July.

An international investigation is under way, but Russia maintains the Ukrainian government and military brought down the plane.

Mr. Abbott has also been critical of Russia’s backing for the pro-Moscow militants and its annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea peninsula. In a meeting with Mr. Putin ahead of last month’s Group-of-20 summit in Australia, Mr. Abbott demanded the Russian president do more to assist the Dutch-led investigation into the downing of the airliner, and to end his support for the rebels.

“I would say to Mr. Putin that this is an opportunity to be a statesman as well as a patriot,” Mr. Abbott said Thursday. Mr. Poroshenko said he had discussed nuclear-energy cooperation with his counterpart, but didn’t say whether the Australian prime minister’s specific offer had been accepted.

“There is the possibility for Ukraine to buy Australian uranium for our nuclear power stations,” Mr. Poroshenko said, telling reporters that Mr. Abbott, who is beset by slumping voter support at home, was among one of his own country’s most popular foreign leaders.

As well as being a major coal exporter, Australia is one of the biggest suppliers of uranium, and holds the world’s largest recoverable reserves of yellowcake. Mr. Abbott’s government earlier this year suspended uranium supplies to Russia as part of a swath of retaliatory trade and banking-related embargoes imposed in the wake of the MH17 disaster.

Wreckage of Flight MH17 Arrives in Netherlands

Trucks carrying parts of the wreckage of downed Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 arrive at Gilze-Rijen military base in the Netherlands Tuesday, from Ukraine.

Associated Press

AMSTERDAM—The first pieces of wreckage of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 arrived in the Netherlands on Tuesday from Ukraine.

Two convoys of trucks arrived at the Gilze-Rijen military air base, and another two are scheduled to arrive later in the week.

The wreckage could provide more clues about the cause of the crash, and investigators will reconstruct parts of the Boeing Co. 777 jetliner. They have set up a research facility in one of the air base’s hangars.

The Netherlands suffered the highest death toll in the July 17 disaster, and it is leading the international investigation into the crash and identification of the victims.

Flight 17 was most likely downed by a missile when it was traveling to Kuala Lumpur from Amsterdam, a catastrophe that killed all 298 people aboard and rained shards of aircraft and bodies across a remote conflict zone controlled by pro-Russia rebels.

Ukraine, the U.S. and other Western governments have said the rebels, who were armed with surface-to-air missiles, are responsible for the crash. Moscow, however, blames Ukraine.

The recovery of the wreckage had been delayed because of fighting between Ukrainian government forces and the separatist fighters. A train carrying the wreckage left the area on Nov. 23 for the government-controlled city of Kharkiv, where it was transferred to trucks that needed around a week to get to the Netherlands.

The Dutch Safety Board, the government body in charge of the crash investigation, in September issued an interim report that found high-energy objects struck the plane and caused it to break apart.

European officials consider new ways to safeguard airliners from military threats in the wake of #MH17 crash: http://t.co/V3CpGlIibH

Europe Presses for New Air-Travel Safeguards

Debris from the crash site of the Malaysian Airlines Flight MH17 is being load at the Pelahiivskyi train station ahead of its transportation to Kharkov last month.

TASS/Zuma Press

European air-safety officials are considering novel steps to safeguard airliners from potential military threats in the wake of July’s downing of a Malaysia Airlines jet, but some proposals are provoking controversy among other countries.

The safety discussions follow the death of 196 Dutch citizens and 102 victims from other nations in the presumed shootdown of Malaysia Flight 17 by a high-altitude antiaircraft missile over eastern Ukraine. Propelled by intense public demands for action in the Netherlands, Dutch authorities are pushing to create a first-of-its-kind passenger notification system—intended to explicitly warn travelers about possible dangers of flights over war zones—according to industry and government officials.

Specifics are under debate and the outcome remains unclear. Dutch officials envision that such warnings would be provided to passengers before takeoff, according to these officials. But it remains unclear exactly how or when travelers would receive the notifications.

The initial concept sparked strong opposition from international safety experts concerned about unilateral action by the Netherlands or the European Commission.

At the same time, the European Aviation Safety Agency, the region’s premier regulator, is conducting a detailed safety review in conjunction with military and intelligence groups of recent overflights of various countries by Russian military planes. EASA previously steered clear of military matters, but an agency spokesman said European Union defense officials asked it to investigate the matter more closely.

Russia in the past has denied its flights are provocative.

The separate initiatives highlight Europe’s continued focus on finding new ways to protect passenger planes from the fallout of hostilities on the ground or military maneuvers in the air.

The issues are expected to come to a head on Tuesday and Wednesday during closed-door meetings in Montreal, when a task force set up by the International Civil Aviation Organization, an arm of the United Nations, debates recommendations for stepped-up warnings to airlines about airspace hazards.

Both EASA and ICAO, as the U.N. group is known, seek more extensive security data to provide better guidance to carriers about where it is and isn’t safe to fly.

The high-level group advising ICAO favors, among other things, more-coordinated sharing of information about hostile threats to commercial aviation world-wide. Members of the task force, according to people involved in the process, also are seeking a compromise that will satisfy Dutch passenger-rights advocates while avoiding disruptions to current ticketing and routing arrangements.

Dutch officials didn’t respond to requests for comment. Spokesmen for ICAO and the International Air Transport Association, the airline industry’s top global trade group, have declined to comment on details of the task force’s deliberations.

Based on preliminary recommendations, the ICAO panel is expected to call for more timely and proactive steps to formally alert carriers when airspace is closed due to identification of antiaircraft missiles or other advanced weapons on the ground. In addition, ICAO already has launched pilot programs to set up centralized clearinghouses of updated information about shifting military threats to airliners.

ICAO’s policy-making council won’t consider any proposals until February and internal plans indicate some of the changes could take many more months—or even years—to implement. Nonetheless, one ICAO document emphasizes “there is significant room for improvement to reinforce and enhance” civil aviation safety with regard to conflict zones.

Patrick Ky, EASA’s executive director, told a hearing of the European Parliament’s transportation committee in September that his agency was entirely dependent on U.S. intelligence in assessing the safety of airspace in other regions. Since then, however, the downing of Flight 17 and its aftermath have led EASA to start working more closely with European military and intelligence personnel to develop ways to share relevant security information, according to industry and government officials.

“Intelligence services should share information about air-space issues better,” Peter van Dalen, a Dutch member of the European Parliament’s transportation committee, said. The information should be circulated among security services and all airlines, he said, expressing frustration that some carriers were avoiding Ukrainian air space before the Malaysian airliner was shot down while others continued flying there.

Traditionally, intelligence agencies have opposed to widely sharing information, particularly with companies. That remains a potentially major stumbling block for ICAO’s plans.

Thomas Windmuller, senior vice president for security at IATA, the airline trade group, said the challenge can be managed through the type of information that is shared. “We don’t need to know sources and methods” by which the intelligence was collected, he said. “We need to know what the operational consequences are.”

Where there are doubts about airspace security, flights should be barred, Mr. van Dalen said. Ukraine had closed airspace below where Flight 17 was cruising, though left the air space above 32,000 feet clear for airlines to traverse. Partial openings make no sense in an era where “there is so much modern equipment that could be in the hands of insurgents,” Mr. van Dalen said.

David McMillan, a veteran safety official who previously ran Eurocontrol, the region’s umbrella air-traffic control network, is heading up the ICAO task force. At a conference in Abu Dhabi last month, Mr. McMillan said Flight 17 convinced both industry leaders and regulators “to act urgently on what many people saw as a new threat.”

Since the wide-body Boeing 777 was following an authorized route in unrestricted airspace open to any airliner, Mr. McMillan told the audience, the tragedy came “as something of a surprise to many” national aviation authorities. But looking forward, he predicted “it will be exceedingly difficult for intelligence information to be shared” outside existing national cooperative agreements.

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization last month said flights of Russian bombers have surged recently and that alliance members conducted more than 100 intercepts of Russian aircraft this year. The Russian planes typically don’t file flight plans or use transponders, which makes them difficult for civilian air-traffic controllers to detect.

Michael Fallon, the U.K.’s defense secretary, said in a recent interview that such flights provocative and illegal. NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg also urged recently “more transparency and predictability” between Russia and the alliance “to avoid that the crisis spirals into something worse.”

A train carrying debris from the crash site of Malaysian Airlines Flight 17 heads for Kharkiv on Sunday.

Zuma Press

MOSCOW—A train carrying the wreckage of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 left a separatist-controlled area of Eastern Ukraine on Sunday bound for the government-controlled city of Kharkiv, Interfax reported.

The Russian news agency said the debris will later be shipped to the Netherlands, which has suffered the highest death toll in the July 17 disaster and has led the international investigation and identification of the victims.

Flight 17 was downed by a missile when it was traveling from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, a catastrophe that killed all 298 people aboard and rained shards of aircraft and bodies across a remote conflict zone controlled by pro-Russia rebels. Ukraine, the U.S. and other Western governments have said that the separatists, who were armed with surface-to-air missiles, are responsible for the crash, while Moscow blames Ukraine.

The agency said the wreckage is being accompanied by Dutch police and observers from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. The OSCE wasn’t available to comment.

The train, which has 12 freight cars and one passenger car, will arrive in Kharkiv, the largest city in the Eastern Ukraine, on Sunday evening, according to Russian news agencies.

The train is also carrying the remains of some victims. Most of the human remains from the crash have already been recovered and were shipped to the Netherlands via Kharkiv.

Others have noted this, but just adding my $.02. This is a 767-200, not a 777 as Russia says. H-stab too big. #MH17 http://t.co/KXDp5HDMw2

Work Starts in Ukraine to Collect Wreckage of MH17

A crane carries wreckage of the Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 near Hrabove, east Ukraine, on Sunday.

Reuters

HRABOVE, Ukraine—Recovery workers in rebel-controlled eastern Ukraine have started collecting debris from the crash site of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, four months after the plane was brought down.

Sunday’s operation is being carried out under the supervision of Dutch investigators and officials from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. The recovered fragments will be loaded onto trains and ferried to the government-controlled eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, and the investigation into the cause of the crash is being conducted there and in the Netherlands.

All 298 people aboard the Boeing 777 flying from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur were killed when it was shot down July 17 over a rebel-held area of Ukraine. Ukraine and the West have blamed the attack on Russia-backed separatists using a ground-to-air missile.

Russia President Vladimir Putin Leaves G-20 Summit Early

By Rachel Pannett

This handout photo taken Nov. 16, 2014 shows Russia’s President Vladimir Putin waving goodbye as he leaves the G-20 summit in Brisbane, Australia.

Agence France-Presse/Getty Images

Russian President Vladimir Putin left a weekend meeting in Australia of the world’s wealthy and developing nations ahead of other world leaders Sunday, after facing stiff criticism over Moscow’s role in the Ukraine crisis.

As leaders gathered for a meeting of the Group of 20 major economies in Brisbane, British Prime Minister David Cameron took a swipe at Moscow and threatened tougher sanctions against Russia, while his Canadian counterpart Stephen Harper told Mr. Putin to “get out of Ukraine” amid unconfirmed reports of Russian troops and tanks entering Ukraine.

Russia and Ukraine loomed over the weekend forum, as world leaders met to sign off on a target of global growth of 2% or more by 2018, agreed in February during a meeting of world finance ministers.

The leaders of the U.S., Australia and Japan on Sunday issued a joint statement saying they agreed on “bringing to justice those responsible for the downing of Flight MH17” in eastern Ukraine. The U.S. and other nations have accused Russia of stoking violence that led to the shooting down of the Malaysia Airlines flight in July by Moscow-backed separatists, killing all 298 people on board. Russia has rejected any link to the shooting down of the airliner, as well as accusations of sending troops and armored vehicles into Ukraine.

In the lead-up to the G-20 meeting, Australia’s navy tracked a small but powerful Russian fleet making its way south in international waters off Australia’s northeast coast, led by a missile cruiser and accompanying destroyer, with two support ships. The Russian Embassy said the ships were researching climate change.